Wild imaginations

C and Bug have been developing their imaginative play recently.  When my nephews started playing imaginatively they were watching a lot of Fireman Sam, so play involved fighting fires and conducting rescues.  My children visit castles and watch Peter Pan, so their imaginative play is all about pirate ships, treasure chests, dragons, crocodiles, castles and dungeons (as well as Gruffaloes and Bears from "We're going on a Bear Hunt" by Michael Rosen and Helen Oxenbury and "The Gruffalo" by Julia Donaldson!).

I love watching them play together.  At the moment the imagination is largely led by C (he's three and a half), while Bug (just 2) follows along, copies, and occasionally follows his instructions, when she feels like it.  The sofa might be a castle, a pirate ship or a treasure island.  The washing basket is the pirate ship.  A bunch of old necklaces in a cardboard box is the treasure - We're currently creating a new treasure chest, more on that in a few days!  If I happen to pass by then I am roped in to be a crocodile complete with ticking clock sound effects, or a shark.  Sometimes I might be caught and put in prison in the dungeon...

Bug has different priorities.  Her imaginative play, as well as following on from C's, centres on food.  She loves the pretend kitchen and will bring me dish after dish of delectable offerings, pretend chocolates and cakes, to which I have to make appropriately appreciative noises as I gobble them down.

I'm eager every day to see what they will come up with next.  I'm going to make a few more bits (appropriate for the subject matter that they like to play) for the dressing-up-box, and move it somewhere more accessible than Bug's wardrobe, so that they can include clothes and props in their play.